What is the scariest moment of your life?

In My Humble Opinion
41

I got caught in a riptide at Nags Head, NC and was very sure that I was about to drown 20 feet from the shore and right in front of my wife and friends.

I swam out to a sandbar and then started to swim back in. About 20 feet from the beach I noticed that I wasn’t getting any closer and, in fact, could feel the rip tide coming back toward me. Instead of remaining calm, turning parallel to the shore and swimming out of the tide, I did EXACTLy what you aren’t supposed to do - I paniced and tried to swim harder. Hell, there were people within yards of me playing and laughing - can’t they see that I’m in trouble? I tried to open my mouth to yell for help but got a mouthful of sea water. I fought harder.

I have no idea what happened but I then found myself washed up on the beach, puking seawater and absolutely exhausted. I layed on the beach for about 10 minutes and couldn’t move. People were stepping over me, walking around me, kind of muttering “What the hell’s up with him - must be drunk.”

Oddly enough, as scary as it was during the event, it was AFTER the event, when I had time to recollect on it, that I was even more scared.

42

You joke, but the first time this happened to me, I was a little scared. Two stories.

1 – scary) The first time this happened to me in my life, I was about 15. I woke up with “dead arm”, couldn’t move it or feel it. I started thinking to myself, “you’ve slept on your arm for 8 hours. You’ve had no circulation for 8 hours. Its going to turn black and die. You lost your arm because you slept on it wrong. Why didn’t anyone ever tell me something like this could happen?” And then sensation started to come back. For about 15 seconds, though, I thought I’d “killed” my arm.

2 – funny) I woke up with “dead arm” once and must not have realized it (still sleepy, didn’t use it, something). I walked to the end of my bed on my knees. Now, I tried to lean forward, catch myself on the footboard with my dead arm, and reach out to turn on the TV at the foot of my bed with my other arm. Instead, my arm didn’t move, and I fell face first and slammed my forehead into the top edge of the footboard.

43

I have two, one physical, one emotional.

  1. Riding out the Northridge quake in 1994. Eek! I was waiting for the ceiling to fall and kill me already so I wouldn’t be scared. That’s when I found out it is possible to be too scared to make a sound, I couldn’t even squeak.

  2. The horrible, awful sinking feeling of fear I got when I realized my ex was, indeed, going to dump me. My world fell apart. I’ve gotten it put back together, though, new boyfriend and everything. But I’ve never felt such sick fear as I did during the moment I realized everything was NOT going to be all right.

44

I did something like this once. Woke up to hear my cell phone ringing, which was on my dresser. I flung myself across the bed, reached for the dresser, and needed just a few more inches. Scooted off the bed a little, put my left arm down for support and whap! faceplant onto the floor. I must have laughed at myself for something near half an hour. And I had a little bit of rugburn on my nose, just to make people ask me what had happened.

45

The worst? Jumping off the Bloukrans Bridge in South Africa, head first into a 216 meter ravine.

Yeah, a bungee jump. A calculated risk, I hear you say. Rationalising is easy, you’ve got a strong elastic cord attached to your ankles. Right?

Wrong. The second you dive off the bridge, all sorts of previously dormant primordial instincts kick in, telling you in no uncertain terms: “YOU DUMBASS. NOW YOU’RE GONNA DIE!” :slight_smile:

Oh, sure, these instincts die back down as soon as the elastic kicks in, but for the duration of that three second free fall, you’re convinced that THIS IS IT.

Can’t wait to do it again. :smiley:

And more of an emotional scare: getting a text message on my cell in the middle of the night, from my wife, who lives halfway across the world from me. “Car crash. Car totalled.” :eek:

Luckily, she was mostly all right. But the 15 seconds it took for her to pick up her cell seemed to last a lifetime.

46

Scariest ever was when I was about 19. I was staying at a friend’s for the night. She, I, her brother, her brother’s friend and her dad were going to go to a bar. Us four younger ones went off and did our own thing and left her dad to hang around the women his age. When we left we stopped at McDonald’s for a late meal. I thought her dad was acting kinda weird, and a little goofy, but I didn’t realize at the time why. When we got in the truck to leave, he was being a real jerk on the road: tailgating small cars, driving like a maniac, etc. It was a while before I realized he was drunk (my dad rarely ever drinks and would never dream of getting drunk when he had to drive, so it never dawned on me that a man would be so irresponsible). So here I am, a 19-year-old girl, sitting in the cab of a pickup truck with a drunk driver. He was driving too fast, taking curves much faster than trucks should take them, and I remember thinking, “I’m going to die.”

Sure enough we took a curve too fast, hit the ditch, bounced up onto someone’s lawn, and barely avoided a tree before we came to a stop. Fortunately, no one was hurt. And did the asshole ask if we were okay, or express worry that he might’ve killed his children? Nope. He commented on the state of his truck. To this day, he’s the only person I’ve ever regretted not hitting.

47

#1 scariest moment of my life: Sept. 11, 2001, my dad worked at the Pentagon. When I found out a plane hit the Pentagon, I freaked. I couldn’t get through on the phone to anyone, my dad, my mom, my brother, my aunt. I didn’t know if my dad was OK. An hour went by and I couldn’t get in touch with anyone. I was going berserk. Finally, my dad got through to my mom, and my mom got through to me, and I found out he was OK. That was the BEST moment of my life, finding out my dad was OK!

48

I wasn’t the best driver when I first got my DL, but all my meager skills were put to the test one winter morning. I had a Mock Trial practice at school at 7 am. However, I had to take Jaime to work–he worked about 20 miles away. It was dark and snowing very hard at 6. I drove him through one canyon to work, very, very carefully, and got him there safely. I thought I put the worst of it behind me.

I was wrong.

I had to go through a different canyon to get to school, and over a dam. At that time of morning, there was no traffic, and even if there was, it was so dark and the blizzard was so bad that I couldn’t have seen them. I knew there was a cliff and a giant lake on the right side, but I didn’t know where, exactly. Obviously there was on street lights or lamps. The snow was coming down so hard it actually lookd like there was fog on the road. No plows out…and even if there was, they wouldn’t have made a difference.

It took about 30 minutes or so to get over that summit and I saw the plows on the other side. I followed one all the way down, and reached the school in one piece. I drove in weather like that a lot that year…when I moved to California, I didn’t drive for nearly two years because even though I never was hurt, it shook me to my core.

More recently, I thought I had evidence that my husband was having an…inappropriate relationship…with a friend of mine. My whole world fell apart. I was in hysterics. I mean, absolutely crazy. Confused, hurt, shocked, scared…a real mess. It took pretty much the whole weekend to straighten out, and I had residual feelings of fear and anger for a long time, though I was satisfied that he wasn’t actually guilty of anything. I never want to go through that again.

49

Shortly before Xmas, last year, I was driving my van down I-79N after dropping a friend off in Mo’town. I was accompanied by a good friend of mind, driving the speed limit and making good time. There was snow on the ground, but the road looked reasonably free of ice. “Looked” was the operative word, as I hit a patch of black ice and, while attempting to get control of the van, did a 360 and hit a guardrail, smashing the front left side of the van. Neither of us was even bruised, and we managed to drive the car off the side of the road. The car itself, however, was totaled, and I didn’t have the right kind of insurance to pay for what they came to call a “no-fault” accident (collision insurance is a good thing, I learned). That said, it helped me and the afore-mentioned friend of mine grow a good bit closer.

Still, those few seconds spinning in the front seat of what used to be my van were some of the most surreal of my life.

That’s mine, anyhoo.
bamf

50

  1. 1987 or so: Riding in a truck at night with a boyfriend and another friend. Boyfriend was in a pissy mood and driving like an asshole down a dark twisty road. Suddenly, our headlights went out! Boyfriend slammed on the brakes and the truck started spinning out of control. I knew the road well and remembered that in our general area there was a dropoff on one side of us and a cliff wall on the other. I thought we were heading for the dropoff and knew we would not survive the fall. We ended up slamming into the cliff wall instead. Afterwards I had a wee breakdown but was quite calm during the actual event.

  2. A couple of months ago, my husband managed to tear something in his calf one night so we drove to Emergency to find out how serious it was. After 20 minutes or so, a doctor came out to talk to me and told me that while talking about the leg my husband had fainted and had a seizure. It turned out to be just from the stress of being in a hospital but at that moment I felt true fear for the first time ever. I had never felt that lost or helpless before.

51

#1 Having a stroke June 10, 2001. Initial left-sided blindness,numbness paralysis, and barely able to speak. 3 years out, the horror and fear from that experience still haunts me. Pain was bearable but everything in my life being thrown into question and having lots of my dreams destroyed - that’s tough. On the up side, I’m 99.9% recovered and have a much healthier life now (emotionally and physically).

#2 Heart repair procedure while conscious March 2002. I had a hole between the atrium in my heart and it needed to be closed to reduce my stroke risk. A little device via catheter was fed through my vena cava while I lay on a table completely conscious. I could feel it going up stomach, then I had a stabbing pain while it made it’s way through my chest. I couldn’t breathe that well. The nurse gave me more valium to relax me. Then the device was put on either side of the hole in my heart. I could feel a slight fluttering then a quick stab of pain as the device clamped the hole closed. Yeah, no picnic.

#3 Meningitis scare March 2002. After my heart procedure, I developed a bad UTI with a fever and stiff neck so I was rushed to the ER at 3AM. I explained my symptoms to a bunch of people who, for reasons unknown, thought I had meningitis. I was given an extremely painful IV into my right had with powerful antibiotics then I was told to lie on my side and curl up. The doctor pressed into my back a bunch and swabbed it with some topical numbing ointment. Then the needle went in and hit nerves and bone, no spinal juice. 2nd time - same thing happened. 3rd time - no juice. 4 - 9 times just hitting nerves and bone and actually not “tapping” my spine. So, I was in quarantine for a week until they realized that I just had a really vicious UTI. Go figure. The bruises along my spine really understood. :rolleyes:

#4 My father’s abuse and mental illness 1976 - 2003.
My father survived WWII in Europe and was severely messed up because of it plus he had mommy issues. So, I was routinely beaten throughout my childhood. He’d chase me up the stairs or drag me up the stairs if I fell and beat me. Or he’d shove me and beat me when I was on the ground. Usually he didn’t punch but occasionally he did. If he did punch, he did it on bony areas like my head, shoulders, or shins (less bruising you know). My infractions ranged from not finishing my dinner to laughing when he was having a bad day. In 2001, as I lay paralyzed in my hospital bed, my father told me because he hit me, he knows I will survive. Yeah, did I mention my father was mental? Now he’s in therapy and medicated.

52

Another “looking back, that was really scary”. At the time, my brain was too addled for me to fully register the seriousness…but scared my (now) husband spitless.

We and a friend were driving back to Ohio after visiting New England. My allergies were really acting up from all of the pine pollen I had endured earlier that day. I asked the friend if he had any asprin and he said to look in his shaving kit. I popped two Bayer-with-Sudafed and laid down on the back seat (this all makes sense at the end).

We pulled off the road about an hour later (~3 am) to eat a few sandwiches that we had packed. I wasn’t feeling really well. Kinda queasy and dizzy. I thought it was just allergies (and I was right…sort of). I wanted to sit in the front seat of the SUV because I didn’t want to get car sick and I do sometimes in the back seat. I remember putting my foot on the running board to get in…

And then I remember someone saying, “Babe, hey Babe, Babe look at me!” I didn’t really know what that word meant or that it somehow meant me. When I started being able to feel my body, someone was hitting me in the chest (That’s what it felt like at the time. Actually the hubby was doing a sternum rub. Pain is a great stimulus) When I finally became aware of my surroundings, I was flat on my back in a parking lot. How the hell did I get down here?!? I’d had a grand mal seizure.

This is where it all goes Keystone Cops. It was a pre-cell phone world and hubby and our friend both scatter in opposite directions looking for a pay phone, leaving me all by myself, on my back on the blacktop…and it begins to rain. Husband finds a payphone first and dials 911. He calls out to Friend to go back and turn me on my side. So friend turns me and rolls me right under the SUV. I found all of this utterly hysterical and start to laugh, which prompts Friend to think that I am having another seizure and sends him into a panic. Which just makes me laugh even harder. The (private) ambulance shows up and it’s Ma and Pa Kettle. No, really. It was a husband and wife team and we had clearly gotten them out of bed, as she was still in her housecoat. She was a larger, friendly faced lady with her hair twisted on top of her head in a bun and he was just a slip of a guy who had buttoned his shirt up wrong and neglected to zip his fly. It just got too surreal for me and I had a fit of the giggles something fierce. The husband thought I was going into shock…until I pointed out that the barn door was open and the horse was trying to escape. He wasn’t wearing any underpants. :eek:

We arrive at Lockhaven (PA) Hospital and the ambulance crew asks the ER doctor where he wants to put me. He says, “I don’t care where you put her, I’m outta here in 15 minutes.” :mad: I don’t like hospitals, I’m terrified of needles, I’m not too keen on being messed with and prodded and I’m miles away from home. I did not like this bad man. I wanted to go home. And I said so loudly and often.

They get me into a small room at the ER and hook up all of the cardiac, O2, etc monitors and leave Husband in the room to convince me to stay the night for observation. We are getting into a pretty heated argument about it when I tell him, “I’m going to do it again.” My sight went completely dark, I couldn’t feel my body at all, but for some reason the lightning storm in my brain left me with my hearing. And all I could hear was the monitor above the bed going BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP

I was coming back around just as the crash crew was getting there. I had only been flatlined for about 7 seconds. The first thing I saw was Dr. 15 Minutes. The scrambled egg that was my brain came up with the wonderful idea, “WE’RE OUTTA HERE.” and I began to fight for all I was worth to get up off that table and get the hell outta Lockhaven Hospital. One bitten doctor, a kick in the nuts for a rather large orderly, and minor injuries to one very nice nurse (sorry Kathy, you were really nice to me even if you didn’t get my “Born in East LA” joke about the President) later, Pa Kettle put me in a rather harsh arm-bar and shot me full of La-La drugs. Who knew such a little guy had it in him?

After 3 days in ICU, I was transfered to UPMC where I underwent numerous tests to determine that the most likely cause was an allergy to Sudafed.

53

Scary moments 1 & 2 were virtually the same with one little difference, which I’ll get to. The scary moment was that when I was a grad student, one night I was walking back to my car to go home from a night class. I was by myself, and some kid asked if I knew what time it was. For some reason, he made me really nervous, but I didn’t want to be a bitch, so I told him. He said thanks, I said you’re welcome, I walked to my car and got in. Someone knocked on my closed window. Same kid. He was maybe 12 years old. I rolled down the window and he asked if I had change so he could use the payphone. He was awfully close to the window and I just wanted him to go away, so I reached into my ashtray where I keep all my change, gave him 35 cents and he took it, then held a gun to my head. He kept the gun trained on me as he ran around the front of my car (I was still parked with cars all around), and got in, telling me to give him all my money. I just handed him my purse and he looked like he was going to sit down in the car, but a car drove by and he got out and told me to drive away. I pulled out and started driving. I almost ran over the little fucker. The same thing (almost - I wasn’t yet to my car the second time) happened to me a year later, same parking lot. Both times were so scary because there were cars all around me, both times I was on the cell phone with a loved one, and both times I was afraid I’d die.

The only difference - one of the times it happened, my then-fiance dumped me the next day. Oh, yeah, and I broke my finger both times I was robbed sometime during those weeks. The first time I broke my finger it was my pinkie and I slammed it in my trunk putting my TV in there. The second time I slammed it in the door to my bedroom.

54
  1. I’m home alone on a Friday night, about 12 years old. My mother was out bar-hopping and my younger brother (he had to be 10 or 11) was at a buddy’s house for the night, a couple of miles down the road. We lived in a very rural area, miles of woods behind the house (that led to summer cottages) and across the road from us, more woods leading to another lake. We had neighbors that were close, but not that close.

I’m watching television, eating snacks, and just being a young nerd when I thought I heard something in our basement. I play it off and try to go back to watching SNL or whatever (it was fairly late), but then I hear another noise down there, and this time I did not imagine it, it was the sound of the basement door (the one that led to outside). I did not know what to do and started to shake and panic. Then I heard the sounds of footsteps on the wooden basement steps (that led to our kitchen). They were heavy, slow, and deliberate. Someone was in the house, they knew I was alone, and they wanted me dead and I was helpless to stop them.

After about a half dozen steps, I grabbed my empty glass Coke bottle and perched myself near the door that led from the basement to the kitchen. Whoever was coming up was going to have to face me in all of my 12-year old ferocity, armed with a bottle (why I didn’t grab a knife I’ll never know). I could hear the thumps at the top step, and figured instead of giving the intruder the chance to surprise me, I would take the initiative. I grabbed the handle and as quickly as I could, threw the door open, yelling at the top of my lungs, ready to strike the bottle as soon as I saw a face to hit it against.

The face I saw was that of my brother, and behind him, his buddy. They went out, riding their bikes 2 miles in the dark at that late hour just to scare me. Needless to say, it worked.

  1. Living in NH, a group of 4 of us made the two hour or so trek from Exeter (where we lived) up to Funspot to play video games/pinball all night and watch the fireworks (this place was a great 3-story arcade/bowling alley that is open 24 hours a day during the summer). I drove us and we had a great time. Unfortunately we stayed out later than we should and I of course had to get us home. The other three had fallen asleep and even with an open window, the thought of sleep sounded good. I know we are driving on the side of a mountain, but a little shuteye can’t hurt, I just need a little sleep…

THUD!

Scared out of my mind, I open my eyes and plastered to the front windshield is a bat. For whatever reason, the thing somehow hit my car waking me (and the others) up and then falling away as quickly as it came. Although I am sure the bat ended up dead from the collision, I can safely say that it saved at least four lives in the process.

55
  1. A friend of a friend was a notoriously irresponsible mother. She had four children by the time she was 21 but this was when she only had two - a two year old and a one year old. I was 19.

It was summer and we were at another friend summer house, featuring a private pond. The mother had put her children in an inflatable raft and released them on the pond, without life jackets, of course. I was watching the raft and decided to go for a swim (as in, get closer to the raft). Just as I was about 50 ft away, the one year old reaches over the side of the boat and it capsizes.

Honestly I don’t know if anyone noticed at that point but I swam as fast as I could over to the kids. The one year old was under the water but I got him and the two year old clung to the top of my head, pushing me under. The water was over my head and it took all of my strength and determination to get them to the shore.

When we finally landed, the mother was laughing and I was crying and my knees were knocking for about 15 minutes. I never forgave the bitch for putting me through that.

  1. When I was, as a pedestrian, hit by a car. I knew my right arm and left knee were fucked (and still are) but I didn’t know what else might be wrong. I really didn’t want to die or be hurt.

  2. My mother’s 13 hour brain surgery. She’s fine now.

56

None of mine even approach what has gone before. I present them nonetheless.

  1. I have had a lifelong phobia of night intruders. The fact that I grew to be a 6’ 3” grizzly bear type of guy had had little to no effect on this particular quirk of my psyche when I reached college age. One night, after having gone to bed early, I awakened in my pitch-black dorm room. As I gazed around the room, having not yet put on my glasses, I spied a dark form across from me. My extremely nearsighted eyes strove to focus, and finally distinguished the shape of a person standing in front of my closet. I could see one booted foot raised to rest on the closet threshold, which was some five inches off the level of the floor, and one hand was raising a flashlight to examine what lay on the top shelf. My heartbeat was pounding faster and faster in my ears as I lay there, waiting for the intruder to go away. Each time I opened my eyes, though, the shape remained, though the flashlight continued to sweep back and forth. Finally I experienced something that hadn’t troubled me since junior high. Brought on, no doubt, by my state of sheer terror, I started to wheeze from an asthma attack. So much for remaining silent. After a few minutes of gasping for breath (which an intruder could not possibly have failed to notice), I began to suspect that all was not as it appeared to be. There was nothing of value in my room, and certainly not enough of interest to keep anyone perusing my closet shelf for more than a few seconds. I decided that my eyes had to be playing tricks on me. Unable to stand it any longer, I sat up, grabbed my glasses, and turned on the bedside lamp. Sure enough, it was a completely false alarm. The shape that had so terrified me was nothing but a bathsheet that I had tacked over the closet door. The wind coming in through the window had been making it move from side to side, and the brightly colored splotch near the top had served as the “flashlight”. Ridiculous as the whole thing had been, it was the first truly terrifying event of my life.

  2. There are parts of my mind over which I have little control, and one of these is the voice that likes to pretend it’s psychic. It picks up on little “omens” from time to time, and works to convince the more rational parts of my mind that I’ve received a sign, typically one of impending disaster. The fact that these “omens” have never once been correct never seems to convince the little voice to give up trying. One experience, though, did leave me a bit shaken. I was leaving my girlfriend’s house and about to kiss her goodnight when that mischievous voice whispered to me “kiss her well because you won’t survive the night!” I ignored the thought, walked to my car, and proceeded to drive home. Along the way, a significant number of these “omens” jumped out at me. Things like the fact that several cars came close to hitting me en route. Or that I kept hearing sirens. I’m not a superstitious person, but having these plague me was a real annoyance. I arrived home, prepared my dinner, and sat down on the couch with a TV tray. About halfway through my boneless chicken breast fillet, I unsuccessfully tried to swallow too large a portion. As the chicken wedged itself in my throat, the little voice said “See? here it comes!” and for several seconds I honestly thought I was dying. I had almost resigned myself to it when an especially large spasm ejected the offending particle from my throat and I started breathing normally. Probably the closest that I’ve yet come to dying.

  3. The most terrifying event of my life, bar none. Having a nurse hand me my five pound, eight ounce infant daughter and being told “she’s all yours now.” The notion that I was now responsible for this incredibly fragile-looking thing was almost more than I could handle. :eek:

57

I can’t even put these in order, but here goes

Working in a gas station/mini-mart traded shifts with a guy and ended up working nights. A guy comes in with a shopping bag, goes to the back cooler, comes back to the counter, puts the bag down on the counter and pulls out a sawed off shot gun.
“Put the money in the bag” says he
"aaaaaah… aaaaahhhh… "
“And a couple cartons of those Kools too!”
"aaaaaaaahhh… aaahhhh… whilst stuffing the cash from the drawer in the bag. Do you want the change too? " says I.
"NO! Now kneel down behind that counter!! (waving gun)
aaaaaahhh… aaah.
So I COULDN’T, I just couldn’t kneel. I knew he’d kill me back there if I did. I kinda bent my knees a little, made myself shorter than the cash register,
I guess he felt all this was taking too long and grabbed the bag and ran out. Thank goodness. Stayed with that lousy job and they “layed me off” a few months later.

On the back of my husbands bike, a Yamaha V-Max, racing a car going down Broadway in the middle of the day (He would do dumb stuff like that) and as we get to an intersection, just as we get to the intersection we pass a big bread truck thats blocking the view of the obviously red light.

A pickup truck pulls out right in front of us, and pauses, its turning left. I just closed my eyes and waited for death. We must have been going 80 miles and hour. A split second later, I knew we SHOULD be dead, but we weren’t. So I open my eyes and we are still tearing down Broadway. The front brakes are locked so the bike is careening back and forth and my husband is hanging on for dear life, trying to control a 650lb bike going about 50mph by then.

I fell off. No helmet. One leather jacket. Spandex pants.

I flew down the street, on my shoulder blades, ass and legs in the air for about 4 car lengths before turning and starting to roll lengthwise. I went another 4-5 car lengths and by then Carter was on his feet and caught me :eek: The bike was totalled and wedged under a parked car.

Nothing but road rash to show for it.
And probably the one that sticks in my mind the most. That Call, then sitting in the hospital room with him, watching the sun come up through the windows, waiting for the transplant team to arrive.

58

In other words, ‘that bat died a hero’.

59

One of them happened not too long ago:

Wherein Red goes medieval on two thieves

60

When the judge awarded temporay physical custody of my 6 and 10 year olds to my soon-to-be ex-husband, the world went dark from my not breathing, I was so scared. Nothing before or since has been as frightening, although I still hate going to court.